Contents

Introduction

1. The Scottish Government consulted to seek feedback on how
Part 1 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2016 (the Act) should
apply to arrest not relating to criminal offences, including
certain warrant arrests. The feedback received during the
consultation will be used to shape the final regulations under
section 60 of the Act. A draft set of regulations was included in
the consultation paper which enabled the reader to see what
amendments were proposed and why they were seen as necessary.

2. The Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2016 contains procedures
and protections which will apply to all arrests. While the majority
of arrests in Scotland are of people suspected of a criminal
offence, there are arrests for other reasons allowed in various
statutes. For example an arrest for a breach of a protective court
order or a witness arrested under warrant to ensure they attend
court. For these arrests, not all the procedures and protections
set out in the Act are appropriate. Section 60 of the Act allows
Scottish Ministers to make regulations to modify or dis-apply the
Act to arrests that do not relate to criminal arrests. These
regulations will ensure that arrests which do not relate to
criminal offences and certain warrant arrests can be catered for
within the new arrest and custody procedures brought in by the
Act.

3. Although the regulations are of a very technical nature a
full public consultation was considered appropriate to ensure that
proper consideration was given to views regarding the rights which
people arrested in these circumstances should be given.

4. This report provides analysis of the issues raised by
individuals and organisations through that consultation exercise.
As there were only a small amount of responses received the
analysis is a fairly high level summary but the responses
themselves have been published alongside the report for people to
view as they wish – where respondents have indicated they are
content for this to happen which in this case is all of the
respondents to the consultation.